Trump Foreign Policy thread

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Disgraceful that Kushner (as revealed by new emails) is trying to get UNWRA (the UN agency which looks after Palestinian refugees) shut down and is pressuring Jordan to revoke refugee status from its 2 million Palestinian refugees. Also Senator James Lankford (R-Oklahoma) is pushing a bill to force the Dept of State to certify by 2020 that the (approx 5 million) descendents of the 700,000 original refugees are not considered refugees. This is also the Trump admins aim.

Saeb Erekat, the Palestinian chief negotiator, has said Kushner said that the Trump admin wants to defund UNWRA and redirect funding to Jordan for refugees.

.....Kushner and Nikki Haley, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, both proposed ending funding for UNRWA back in January. But the State Department, the Pentagon, and the U.S. intelligence community all opposed the idea, fearing in part that it could fuel violence in the region.

The following week, the State Department announced that that United States would cut the first $125 million installment of its annual payment to UNRWA by more than half, to $60 million.

“UNRWA has been threatening us for six months that if they don’t get a check they will close schools. Nothing has happened,” Kushner wrote in the same email....

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It is inevitable that sometime in the future the state of Jordan will take over the West bank and absorb the Palestinians. And hopefully Egypt will take ove Gaza. That said Donald Trump is a New York Jew. His son in law Kushner is also. What else do you expect from them. They are Israeli government spies.

Banned

It is inevitable that sometime in the future the state of Jordan will take over the West bank and absorb the Palestinians. And hopefully Egypt will take ove Gaza. That said Donald Trump is a New York Jew. His son in law Kushner is also. What else do you expect from them. They are Israeli government spies.

He said himself on several occasions that his father was a Presbyterian and his mother also. This article gives the dominant religion in the Garman area where his grandfather was born as being Lutheran.

If he is lying about his religion, why has no one called him on it? Seems to me you have Trump Derangement Syndrome

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Disgraceful that Kushner (as revealed by new emails) is trying to get UNWRA (the UN agency which looks after Palestinian refugees) shut down and is pressuring Jordan to revoke refugee status from its 2 million Palestinian refugees.

Is it though? Has maintaining the 'Palestinian' diaspora as rootless refugees (I know it helps armchair activists in the West, but I am thinking of the blameless kids born in 70 year old "refugee camps" in the Arab nations) helped matters or harmed matters? Would you call ethnic Hmong kids born in the USA "refugees"? No. So why call a child born in Lebanon to a Mother born in Lebanon, whose mother, grandmother and great-grandmother was born in Lebanon "Palestinian"? Almost none of these people fled lands controlled by Israel. What's better? Keep these people rootless so as to be useful for point scoring or give these blameless people a fair go? Kushner is right, and you're wrong.

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Is it though? Has maintaining the 'Palestinian' diaspora as rootless refugees (I know it helps armchair activists in the West, but I am thinking of the blameless kids born in 70 year old "refugee camps" in the Arab nations) helped matters or harmed matters? Would you call ethnic Hmong kids born in the USA "refugees"? No. So why call a child born in Lebanon to a Mother born in Lebanon, whose mother, grandmother and great-grandmother was born in Lebanon "Palestinian"? Almost none of these people fled lands controlled by Israel. What's better? Keep these people rootless so as to be useful for point scoring or give these blameless people a fair go? Kushner is right, and you're wrong.

I acknowledge its questionable to maintain them as intergenerational refugees. However international law clearly allows refugees to return to their homes, something that Israel has always refused even to the original first generation of refugees.

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True but they are cutting funds to the UN, which now complains of running out of money. And they have cut contributions to UNWRA also. Have no doubt though - the real aim of this is not efficiency but rather to lower the profile of the Palestinian issue.

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Disgraceful that Kushner (as revealed by new emails) is trying to get UNWRA (the UN agency which looks after Palestinian refugees) shut down and is pressuring Jordan to revoke refugee status from its 2 million Palestinian refugees. Also Senator James Lankford (R-Oklahoma) is pushing a bill to force the Dept of State to certify by 2020 that the (approx 5 million) descendents of the 700,000 original refugees are not considered refugees. This is also the Trump admins aim.

Saeb Erekat, the Palestinian chief negotiator, has said Kushner said that the Trump admin wants to defund UNWRA and redirect funding to Jordan for refugees.

It is just one example of the absolute chaos and dereliction in American foreign policy - with North Korea as one outstanding example. When is North Korea denuclearising? Right here, right now? Well that was two months ago. Then they were going to start by Trump's re-election bid. Now they will be setting the timetable themselves - such is the latest news. At the same time, US and American intelligence reports the North Korean program is still continuing.

... And Trump is swanning around bombastically praising himself for his "win" with Kim Jong Un.

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True but they are cutting funds to the UN, which now complains of running out of money. And they have cut contributions to UNWRA also. Have no doubt though - the real aim of this is not efficiency but rather to lower the profile of the Palestinian issue.

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I acknowledge its questionable to maintain them as intergenerational refugees. However international law clearly allows refugees to return to their homes, something that Israel has always refused even to the original first generation of refugees.

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True but they are cutting funds to the UN, which now complains of running out of money. And they have cut contributions to UNWRA also. Have no doubt though - the real aim of this is not efficiency but rather to lower the profile of the Palestinian issue.

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I acknowledge its questionable to maintain them as intergenerational refugees. However international law clearly allows refugees to return to their homes, something that Israel has always refused even to the original first generation of refugees.

I'm not denying Arabs were expelled from their lands. So were over a million Germans after the war. My question is: What's the solution? Get on with life or indoctrinate yet another blameless generation of Arab kids in a Quixotic and suicidal campaign against equally blameless Israeli kids? You're smart enough and moral enough to know the answer to that question Dame.

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I'm not denying Arabs were expelled from their lands. So were over a million Germans after the war. My question is: What's the solution? Get on with life or indoctrinate yet another blameless generation of Arab kids in a Quixotic and suicidal campaign against equally blameless Israeli kids? You're smart enough and moral enough to know the answer to that question Dame.

I dont think comparisons with the Germans are fair. The Germans were occupying most of Europe. The Arabs of Palestine were the fall guys for Europe's war guilt about the Holocaust. I think Israel has brought most of its security problems on itself by its flagrant disregard for international law and in particular by its rejection of the 2002 Arab Peace Initiative, which was re-offered a few years ago. It is never accepting to fire tank shells and air strikes at demonstrators. Sky had a report last night called "Hotspots" and journalists said from what they could see these were largely unarmed demonstrators being gunned down. Again its like Irish history including the apologists' arguments. The Israelis make themselves look very bad by their indifference to civilian suffering on the other side.

No, sorry you're wrong. Ethic Germans were all over Eastern Europe for centuries. There were Germanic enclaves in the Baltics and as far east as the Ukraine. If the analogy is unfair, it is unfair to the Germans, not the "Palestinians".

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No, sorry you're wrong. Ethic Germans were all over Eastern Europe for centuries. There were Germanic enclaves in the Baltics and as far east as the Ukraine. If the analogy is unfair, it is unfair to the Germans, not the "Palestinians".

There was an Arab majority in Palestine for maybe 1400 yrs judging by the Ottoman records of the religion of the inhabitants. If they can be expelled to set up a new state then noone is safe. The Zionist regime - especially with the Nation State law - has shown it can't accept the concept of a multi-ethnic state in the way other western countries have done. I am a critic of multiculturalism but Im also opposed to turfing out people who have lived in a region for centuries.

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There was an Arab majority in Palestine for maybe 1400 yrs judging by the Ottoman records of the religion of the inhabitants. If they can be expelled to set up a new state then noone is safe. The Zionist regime - especially with the Nation State law - has shown it can't accept the concept of a multi-ethnic state in the way other western countries have done. I am a critic of multiculturalism but Im also opposed to turfing out people who have lived in a region for centuries.

1. Was there? And what before then? So now as long as you hold the land for x number of years you get "y"? Do you even see where this leads? Want to talk history? OK. Arabs are from the Arabian peninsula. Not the Mediterranean. Should they all evacuate back there? Of course not. This line of attack is garbage.
2. Yes, everyone is safe
3. A religion of a few million people might need to change the rules a bit when surrounded by over a billion others who want them to cease existing.

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1. You rely on Muslim records
2. Yes, everyone is safe
3. All of your arguments can be used against you to defend the right of Jews to live there. Arabs are from the Arabian peninsula, not the med.
4. A religion of a few million people might need to change the rules a bit when surrounded by over a billion others who want them to cease existing.

Argument 4 is backward looking and ignores the Arab Peace Initiative and the recent raproachment between Israel and the Gulf Arab states especially Saudi Arabia as well as the peace agreements with Egypt and Jordan. Personally I wouldnt be keen on a country if it was treating the Irish like the Israelis treat the Palestinians. Bibi is just another nasty nationalist leader like Putin and Milosevic.

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Argument 4 is backward looking and ignores the Arab Peace Initiative and the recent raproachment between Israel and the Gulf Arab states especially Saudi Arabia as well as the peace agreements with Egypt and Jordan. Personally I wouldnt be keen on a country if it was treating the Irish like the Israelis treat the Palestinians. Bibi is just another nasty nationalist leader like Putin and Milosevic.